re: Gatsby

not really. its not getting rave reviews or anything, but so far the critic reviews have been floating around 45-55%. again that isn't great, but that's far from getting "hammered". right now it has 63 fresh and 68 rotten.

quote:Definitely not getting hammered by the audience (which I believe is a more accurate indicator of a movie's quality), but I would consider 47% (critic review) a good ole hammering.

its only had a little over one hundred critic reviews in the last day or two. almost half the critics liked it, the other half didn't. "getting hammered" would be somewhere between 0-30% in my opinion. hanging around the 50% mark so far is not getting hammered especially when you also factor in the 57,000 audience reviews that are at 84% right now.

Understandable. I was talking more of a critic I read who hated the movie because it was more fast paced the first half, and life slowed down more in the second half. That type of critique is complete shit, because that is what the book is like.

I really enjoyed that movie when I saw it in the theater at 15. The interesting characters to me were the Nick Carraway (Sam Waterston), Jordan Baker (Lois Chiles) and Tom Buchanan (Bruce Dern) In the 1974 version, I found Jay Gatsby (Redford) and Daisy Buchanan (Mia Farrow) both to be very boring people. The Myrtle Wilson character (Karen Black) was a despicable one.

Redford was more model than actor in some of his roles (Inside Daisy Clover, This Property Is Condemned, Gatsby & The Way We Were) & Daisy was too high maintenance. Gatsby's business partners were also interesting people.

I love Inside Daisy Clover and This Property is Condemned but for Natalie Wood, not Redford. He played those parts well but they didn't require much more than looking good and misbehaving a little.

my indicator for not expecting much from this movie is the fact that out of everyone on campus, the people most excited about it are the sorority girls.

The book is a classic, but it does not and will not appeal to everyone. However - and I'm pretty "meh" on it - its themes fit in perfectly with the younger generation right now: gluttony, excess, ultra consumerism, and arrogance. There's a reaosn the sorority crowd is eating it up.

Sadly, they'll miss the message of "Daisy et al are shite human beings" and go straight for the "tragic romance."

I think that for all its commercial appeal and the beautiful cinematography the movie misses its mark because the book is not a classic because of the story itself. The story from which this movie draws its plot is an average one. The beautiful prose and Fitzgerald's linguistic artistry is what makes the book a great American classic. No matter how visually dazzling the movie was, the movie seemed hollow without the dazzling writing. It's ironic that a movie that is supposed to mock us for being hollow is itself hollow.

Or maybe that's some type of great trick it's playing on us on purpose!!

Nah, but seriously. I thought it was mediocre. And I'm a huge Leo fan.

Enjoyment of the book lies just as much in the beauty of the language and imagery as it does in the story. There were a few passages where i'd think wow that was worded incredibly and I would reread the passage multiple times.

comparing the movie to the book will be its downfall. The writing is incredible and cannot be translated to the screen

If people realize that, I think they will enjoy it

Edit: looks like someone stated it better

quote:I think that for all its commercial appeal and the beautiful cinematography the movie misses its mark because the book is not a classic because of the story itself. The story from which this movie draws its plot is an average one. The beautiful prose and Fitzgerald's linguistic artistry is what makes the book a great American classic.

I need to re-read the book. Ive re-read pretty much every other classic that we had to read in school but this one. I remember thinking it was boring honestly, but I was like 14 so that doesn't mean much.

quote: The story from which this movie draws its plot is an average one.

Actually, the story is what took it from being an initial flop that only sold a few thousand copies to required reading in American Lit classes.

It's a periodic story of the American Dream and how that dream can lead to ruin if you're not careful. If anything, it is a story that sparked the trend which makes it, now, seem average in comparison.

However, and as you stated, the story became a part of the American literary canon because of Fitzgerald's eloquent writing. I hate to use him as an example because he is an easy comparison, but Hemingway novels are almost the exact same. The agony and pain of Old Man and the Sea just cannot be reproduced in a film, no different than the beauty of music cannot be reproduced in words. Some works of art are just not meant to be remade in different formats (or at least not under the same title).

If this movie were titled "The Roaring Twenties" instead of "The Great Gatsby" then it would probably be received better than what it is.

quote:It's a periodic story of the American Dream and how that dream can lead to ruin if you're not careful. If anything, it is a story that sparked the trend which makes it, now, seem average in comparison.

This story has been hashed and rehashed hundreds of times. It's still a slow-moving, character-based, bare-bones story. As you've said, Fitzgerald's brilliant prose it what makes the book. The story could be created by any one of a million authors IMO.

quote:However, and as you stated, the story became a part of the American literary canon because of Fitzgerald's eloquent writing. I hate to use him as an example because he is an easy comparison, but Hemingway novels are almost the exact same. The agony and pain of Old Man and the Sea just cannot be reproduced in a film, no different than the beauty of music cannot be reproduced in words. Some works of art are just not meant to be remade in different formats (or at least not under the same title).

I think a Hemingway adaptation would be very interesting. It would have to be a Castaway-esque story with one helluva main character, but I think it would be atleast interesting to watch the attempt. I also think the blunt, brutal, straight-forward way Hemingway writes would be more easily adaptable than Fitzgerald's flowery prose.

quote:If this movie were titled "The Roaring Twenties" instead of "The Great Gatsby" then it would probably be received better than what it is.

Disagree, it's capitalizing off its title. It's a polarizing book, love it or hate it people will want to see it just to see it IMO.